President Obama assures Angela Merkel on monitoring

10/23/13 1:59 PM EDT

President Barack Obama offered assurances Wednesday to German Chancellor Angela Merkel that the United States is not monitoring her communications, after Merkel learned that her cellphone may have been monitored.

Obama and Merkel spoke by phone earlier Wednesday, and "the president assured the chancellor that the United States is not monitoring and will not monitor the communications of the chancellor," White House press secretary Jay Carney said.

While Carney spoke in the present and future tenses, he did not say whether the National Security Agency had in the past monitored her calls.

Merkel spokesman Steffen Seibert said that the chancellor told Obama "she views such practices, if the indications are confirmed ... as completely unacceptable," The Associated Press reported. She also asked for U.S. authorities to provide more information about their surveillance activities in Germany.

Seibert said Merkel’s call was prompted after the German government "received information that the chancellor's cellphone may be monitored by American intelligence."

In a readout released after Carney’s briefing, the White House said that Obama and Merkel agreed “to intensify further the cooperation between our intelligence services with the goal of protecting the security of both countries and of our partners, as well as protecting the privacy of our citizens.”

“The United States greatly values our close cooperation with Germany on a broad range of shared security challenges,” the White House added. “As the president has said, the United States is reviewing the way that we gather intelligence to ensure that we properly balance the security concerns of our citizens and allies with the privacy concerns that all people share.”